


When You're a Stranger

by glorious_spoon



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-10
Updated: 2010-01-10
Packaged: 2017-12-15 16:56:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/851851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glorious_spoon/pseuds/glorious_spoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the convention, Barnes and Damien get themselves into trouble and end up learning more about hunting than they ever wanted to know.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It doesn't take them long to get in over their heads, which is something Damien thinks, in retrospect, that he should have seen coming. And he'd love to blame it on Barnes, except for the fact that it was kind of both their idea and Barnes is the one laying in a hospital bed babbling in a language that Damien doesn't recognize.  
  
"Ancient Greek," says the dark, curly-haired nurse. Her badge identifies her as Stella Mavroukis, and she has a wide, white, sympathetic smile. "I don't speak it, but I know enough to recognize it. Is he a classics scholar?"  
  
"He fixes printers," Damien says blankly. "It did something to him. The thing."  
  
She nods like he's making sense, although he's pretty sure she'd do the same thing if he said Klingons had done this. Which might actually be less weird than the truth. "Does he have any family we can call?"  
  
Barnes has a brother in high school and parents he hasn't talked to since he came out in college. "Just me," Damien says.  
  
"And you're his...?"  
  
"Boyfriend," he says defiantly. He doesn't quite have the courage to add,  _you have a problem with that?_ , but he wants to.  
  
Her eyebrows go up, but she doesn't say anything else. And that's just as well, because Damien's freaked enough that he doesn't really know what he'll do if someone pushes him.  
  
 _A witch did it,_  he imagines telling her.  _We were investigating a haunted house--yeah, we do that ever since we found out that ghosts are real at a fantasy convention a few months back--anyway, it turned out that it wasn't a ghost, it was a witch and she threw something at Barnes and he's been like this ever since._  
  
Yeah, not such a good plan.  
  
He's read the books, and if even half of what Carver Edlund wrote about is real, he knows that it could have been a lot worse. But it's Barnes, and if he doesn't get back to normal sometime soon they're going to shut him up in a psych ward. And there's only one person Damien can think of who'd have a clue what to do.

***

Sweet-talking people turns out to be a lot harder than Sam and Dean made it sound in the books.  
  
 _Must be nice to be a fictional character_ , Damien thinks sourly when the publisher hangs up on him for the third time that day. "I think that woman has it in for me," he says aloud.  
  
Barnes mumbles something that probably would make perfect sense if he lived in Sparta or something in 300 AD, but the way he's reaching out doesn't require a translation. Damien takes his hand, squeezes it, sighs. Barnes is too pale under his olive complexion, and there are dark circles under his eyes, but other than the fact that he seems to have forgotten how to speak English, there's nothing really wrong with him. That's what everyone's been telling Damien, anyway. It doesn't really help.  
  
"I'm gonna fix this," Damien says, because he's not sure how much Barnes can understand. "I promise."

***

Four days in, the publisher finally takes pity on him and gives him Carver Edlund's phone number. "You'd better not stalk him," she says sternly. Her voice makes him picture a kindergarten teacher, the kind that yells at kids for coloring outside the lines. That's probably not fair. He doesn't really care.  
  
"I'm not going to stalk him," Damien tells her. "Thank you."  
  
When the guy picks up, Damien's sure for a minute that the woman gave him the wrong number. "This is Chuck." He sounds a little drunk.  
  
"Uh," Damien says. "I'm looking for Mr. Edlund."  
  
"I'm going to fire that woman," mumbles the guy. Chuck. "What do you want?"  
  
"It's kind of..." Damien trails off. "Uh, it's hard to explain. Is Mr. Edlund there?"  
  
"Carver Edlund is a pen name," the guy says wearily. "I wrote the books. What do you want?"  
  
"I'm--" Damien breathes out a long sigh. "I really hope you can help me. See, I was at the convention, my boyfriend and I and we--uh--we got tangled in something. And now he keeps babbling in another language and nobody knows what's going on and I just. I don't know who else to call. Who else knows about this stuff."  
  
"I knew I should have gone to dental school," says Chuck nonsensically. There's a slightly hysterical note in his voice that Damien can sympathize with. "Mom told me, but  _no,_  I had to be an  _artist_ , and look where that got me. Angels exploding in my living room. Ghosts haunting my conventions. Demon hunters crashing on my couch. I'm just a  _writer_ , okay?"  
  
"Okay," Damien says in a small voice. His heart feels like it might have bypassed his stomach and sunk all the way down to his feet, and he feels painfully exposed in this sterile hospital hallway outside Barnes' room. "So you can't help?"  
  
"No," Chuck says irritably. "But I can tell you who can. He's gonna  _kill_  me," he adds in an unhappy undertone.  
  
Then he rattles off a number, so fast that Damien barely catches it, instructs Damien never to contact him again, and hangs up.  
  
For such a great writer, he's kind of an asshole. But now Damien's got a number, which is better than nothing.

***

"Singer Salvage, this is Bobby."  
  
 _"What?"_  Damien yelps into the mouthpiece.  
  
"Help you with something?" It's the twangy kind of drawl that half the people around here have; the ones that have roots centuries deep in this soil, not transplants like him and Barnes.  
  
"You're really Bobby Singer?"  
  
"You deaf, boy?"  
  
"No, I'm just, I--" Damien stops, swallows hard. Okay, so apparently there was a little more reality in those books than he realized. This is still  _so_  not the time to deal with it. "Carv--Chuck gave me your number," he says finally. "He said you could help with a problem I have."  
  
"Like I don't have anything better to do," Bobby growls. "Interfering little prick. Well, spit it out."  
  
As briefly as he can, Damien outlines the situation. It seemed like a good idea at the time, which is something he thinks he needs to get emblazoned on a t-shirt, or something. They've gone after a couple of hauntings since the convention--it's not like they're hunters or anything, but now that they know this stuff is real, what they hell are they supposed to do, ignore it? Anyway, so there was this house down the road from Damien's sister's place where people kept disappearing and...  
  
Okay, in retrospect, they were probably a little overconfident from the two salt-and-burns that went off more or less without a hitch, unless you counted Damien's near-heart attack when the cops showed up the second time. They definitely weren't expecting the tiny, wizened woman hiding in the basement of the house, and then Barnes stepped forward to try to talk to her and she threw a handful of powder in his face and then just disappeared. And Barnes hasn't said a word in English since. They got a translator in, finally. He's been quoting Aristophanes.  
  
There's a long silence when he finishes, then an unmistakable snort. "When you said you got in over your head, you weren't kidding, were you?" Bobby Singer says at last.  
  
"No, sir," Damien says meekly. Meek doesn't really come naturally to him, but if it'll get Barnes back to normal he'll kiss as much ass as he has to.  
  
"Alright, well, haul him on over here and I'll see what I can do."  
  
Damien lets out a relieved breath, then immediately tenses up again. "We're in the hospital. Queen of Mercy. I can't--I mean, couldn't you--"  
  
"I don't make house calls," Bobby Singer says in a voice that isn't even trying to be patient. "You want my help, you bring him here. I'm twenty miles up the highway from the hospital, address is in the phone book."  
  
He hangs up. It's kind of rude, but Damien's been getting used to that.

***

The address is in the phone book. Yellow Pages, even. Singer Salvage is a reputable business in this area, apparently. If he'd ever been the kind of person who fixes his own car with secondhand parts, he'd know that.  
  
Damien's pretty sure this is what it feels like to go insane.

***

It's not easy sneaking Barnes out of the hospital, and the fact that he won't stop talking doesn't help.  
  
At least he can walk, so Damien doesn't have to steal a wheelchair on top of all the other probably-illegal stuff he's already doing. He doesn't know if it's actually illegal to sneak somebody out of the hospital, but it's almost definitely something he could get sued for by--somebody.  
  
Whatever. He slides a hand over Barnes' mouth as yet another nurse passes by their hiding spot near the elevator. Barnes doesn't struggle, but he's still trying to talk, breath warm against the palm of Damien's hand.  
  
"Stop that," Damien whispers. "I'm trying to get you better, okay, you need to cooperate."  
  
Barnes mumbles something against his hand, but since it doesn't sound like English, Damien ignores him. Coast is clear, finally, and he hurries his boyfriend into the elevator and punches the button for the ground floor. His sister's truck is waiting out front, and when he sails out of the parking lot and onto the highway in the hot dusk, it's with a feeling that's half-terror, half giddy accomplishment.  
  
This is definitely what it feels like to go insane.


	2. Chapter 2

Singer Salvage turns out to be a sprawling junkyard with an old farmhouse in the center. Damien pulls the truck to a stop a respectful distance away, hauls Barnes out of the cab onto the hot, dry earth. "Barnes," he says. "Hey, B. I wish you could see this--this is Bobby Singer's place, Barnes. For real. It's just like in the books, it's--"  
  
He trails away, because Barnes is looking around with a bright, wide-eyed expression that makes Damien think he's not actually taking any of this in, and that makes a lump lodge itself in Damien's throat. If anyone had told him a week ago that Bobby Singer was a real person and Damien was going to meet him--for real, in the flesh--he'd probably have gone into fits of joy. Now all he can think about is the tenuous hope that the man can put Barnes back to normal.  
  
It's not that Barnes really needs any help walking, but Damien keeps a tight arm around his waist as they approach the house all the same. He feels all weird and exposed out here, and the shape of Barnes' lanky frame pressed against his side is something familiar for him to hang onto.  
  
They make it about ten yards up the dusty path before a booming bark echoes across the empty yard, and hard on the heels of the sound is the most enormous dog Damien's ever seen in his life, a giant bundle of fur and drool and gnashing teeth. He yelps and stumbles back, pulling an unresisting Barnes along with him.  
  
"Romney!" barks a voice from the porch. "Stand down."  
  
Just like that, the snarling animal goes docile, turns its head and  _yips_  for all the world like it understands, and Damien blinks the sun and fear out of his eyes, squints up at the porch for his first look at Bobby Singer.  
  
He's...not what Damien was expecting. Baseball cap pulled low over a sour, weathered face, layers of dingy flannel and denim, shotgun resting in his lap. He doesn't stand up when the dog bounces up the steps and nudges at his knee, and now Damien can see that what he thought was a lawn chair is actually a wheelchair. Bobby Singer must have notices the startled flick of his eyes, because he scowls.  
  
"Don't get any bright ideas. I can more than look after myself, 'specially against a pair of morons like you two." He pats the gun in a way that isn't even remotely reassuring. "Get your asses up here."  
  
Damien keeps one wary eye on the dog and edges closer, pulling Barnes along with him. "Sir, it's a very great honor--"  
  
"Save it," Bobby Singer interrupts irritably. "That your boy? Bring him here where I can see him."   
  
"This is Barnes," Damien says, climbing the steps. "I'm Damien."  
  
"Yeah, Bert and Ernie," says Bobby cryptically. "I heard. You said she threw powder in his face?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"What in hell were you boys thinking, going into a haunted house like that?" Damien opens his mouth, flushing, and Bobby shakes his head. "Never mind. At this point, I don't give a rat's ass. Go ahead in."  
  
It feels weird to guide Barnes past Bobby's wheelchair and into the cool, dusty house; it's not until after he's inside that Damien realizes that this way Bobby didn't ever have to present his back to them. Nobody's ever treated him like a threat before. It'd be kind of cool under any other circumstances at all.  
  
"Aren't you worried we're possessed, or something?" Damien asks as Bobby wheels himself into the house. He snorts.  
  
"No," he says, and jerks his head at the doorframe. Damien squints; there's a line of white powder that must be salt laid down in a deep groove across the doorstep, where the wheels from Bobby's chair won't mess it up.  
  
Bobby's wheelchair. That sure as hell wasn't in the books, but there's probably no polite way to ask about it. So he doesn't. "Can you help Barnes?" he asks instead.  
  
"Yep," says Bobby succinctly, and the relief that courses through Damien makes him weak in the knees. "Gonna take a while, though. Hope you don't have anyplace important to be for the next couple of days."  
  
Barnes is more or less freelance, but Damien's down to his last week of vacation. And he  _so_  does not care. "No, sir. So, what do we--"  
  
"You go in the living room and stay out of my way," Bobby says. "Your boyfriend comes in the kitchen so I can get a look at him." Damien hesitates, but Bobby's already wheeling away, and the last thing he wants to do is aggravate the man. He has a feeling it wouldn't take much, so he guides Barnes into the kitchen and folds him gently into a chair, untangles Barnes' fingers from his shirt, and backs out of the room.

***

Bobby's living room is huge, dusty, and cluttered. The red sunset streams in through dirty windows, illuminating stacks of ancient-looking books and incomprehensible tools all jumbled up incongruously with take-out boxes and beer bottles. In spite of the circumstances, Damien can't suppress a small thrill. It's  _real_. It's all real, and that's Bobby Singer in the kitchen clattering around and muttering under his breath, and those are grimoires and books about demon-lore scattered across every available surface, and if he lifted the rug he's sure he'd see a devil's trap drawn underneath. His fingers itch to touch, but he shoves his hands resolutely in his pockets. Bobby can help them. No matter how curious he is, Damien is not going to screw that up.  
  
Of course, that presents a problem because there's nowhere to sit down. There are stacks of hardcovers the size of paving stones and even a few things that look like  _scrolls_ jammed haphazardly together on the couch. It doesn't look organized in any sense of the word that Damien is familiar with, but  it's probably better if he just keeps his hands to himself and stays standing.  
  
There are photos over the cracked mantle-piece, some of them framed, some just shoved into the frame of a large, fly-spotted mirror. Looking at photos probably doesn't count as nosy, right?  
  
He strains his ears toward the kitchen, but all he can hear is Barnes' low, ceaseless mumbling punctuated by the occasional clatter and the squeak of Bobby's wheels, so he picks his way carefully across the room to have a look.  
  
Most of the framed photos are pictures of a pretty, dark-haired young woman who must be Bobby's wife. There's one in the center of her and Bobby. He's wearing a suit and looks impossibly young. The rest of the pictures are a hodgepodge of snapshots: Bobby feeding scraps to a big yellow dog, a scruffy dark-haired man cleaning a rifle on the front porch, and--  
  
Holy shit.  
  
The floor creaks beneath Damien's feet as he shifts closer. The dog-eared photo shows two teenage boys in baggy, faded jeans and t-shirts, standing on top of a beater car under the junkyard sign. The older one has the younger in a headlock and is grinning broadly at the camera. And the thing is, Damien  _recognizes_  him. He's skinny and freckled and a whole lot younger, but it's unmistakably the same guy.  
  
 _It's Dean, actually. The real Dean.  
  
Yeah, right. Okay, 'Dean'._  
  
That same exact smile when Damien laughed at him in the parking lot outside the convention. That same bowlegged posture. And the younger one's face is obscured, but Damien can see sharp cheekbones and a huge, dimpled grin. Holy _shit._  
  
"Believe you've met Sam and Dean," Bobby says behind him, and Damien makes an undignified noise, spins around so fast he almost falls over.   
  
"You knew--they're really- _-what?"_  he sputters.  
  
Bobby looks amused. "Hand me that book there on the mantle. The red one."  
  
Damien fumbles for the book. The old leather blinding is slippery in his hands, but that's not why he nearly drops it. "You mean they're  _real?_  Sam and Dean?"  
  
Bobby's hat and beard conspire to obscure his face in the fading light, but Damien has no doubt that he's rolling his eyes. "'Course they're  _real._ " He maneuvers his wheelchair deftly past teetering stacks of books and into the kitchen and Damien follows him without even thinking about it, head spinning.   
  
"No, but I mean-- _seriously?_ "  
  
"You are deaf, aren't you? Turn on the light. The other switch, idjit."  
  
The dingy yellow overhead sputters to life, and Damien is momentarily distracted by the sight of Barnes slumped loose-limbed in a kitchen chair. "Is he--"  
  
"He's fine," Bobby says without looking up. "You're lucky she just had a weird sense of humor. Half the witches you run into will gut you alive and enjoy doing it."  
  
He doesn't sound like he's joking at all. Damien gulps. "But he's going to be okay. Right?"  
  
"Didn't I just say that? It's a babbling hex. Last time I saw one of these, Dean spent a week talking in dirty limericks." Bobby runs one knotted finger down a page of handwritten text as he speaks. "'Course, with him, it's hard to tell the difference sometimes. Here it is."  
  
 _Dean._  Jesus. He'd love to interrogate Bobby, but Barnes is stirring and mumbling again--still in Greek, damn it--and Damien goes to him, pulls the nearest chair close and grips Barnes' cold hand in his while Bobby putters around them, tossing incomprehensible ingredients into a shallow bowl. Finally, he stirs the mixture three times with his fingertip and hands the whole mess to Damien. "Get him to drink that. I need to wash my hands."  
  
It looks absolutely awful and smells even worse, but Damien resolutely cups Barnes' chin in one gentle hand and pours the concoction into his mouth. Barnes chokes, spits, and makes a revolted face, but when he looks at Damien there's sense in his eyes.  
  
"Hey," Damien says softly. "Are you okay?"  
  
"Είμαι εντάξε," says Barnes morosely.  
  
Crap.  
  
"He's okay," Bobby says, rolling back into the kitchen and wiping his hands on a questionable-looking rag.  
  
"I thought you said this would fix it!"  
  
"Don't get snippy with me. Said it would take time, didn't I?"  
  
"Right." Damien breathes out, slow and calming. "Sorry. So--"  
  
"He'll need another dose in the morning." Bobby pauses, like he's considering something, then shrugs. "Should be sheets on the bed down the hall; I reckon you two could both use some sleep."  
  
That's true enough. It's barely nine o'clock, not even completely dark out, but Barnes still looks half-dead and Damien's hardly slept in the past five days. "I don't know how to thank you," he says fervently.  
  
"From what I hear, you two rescued that pair of chuckleheads back at that hotel," Bobby says evenly. "Suppose I owe you one. Now get to bed before I change my mind."

***

The sheets are musty, but clean. It didn't occur to Damien to bring pajamas or a change of clothes, but he really can't bring himself to care. Barnes strips down to his undershirt and boxers without instruction, which seems to be a good sign, and they curl together under the covers as the last of the light fades from the room.

"As soon as you can talk back, I am so going to yell at you," Damien murmurs, but he doesn't really mean it.

Barnes snorts and curves an arm over Damien's hip. "κάτσε ήσυχα."

 


	3. Chapter 3

Damien wakes up to an empty bed, a full bladder, and the smell of coffee brewing. It takes him a few minutes to figure out where he is and what he's doing there, but when he does he's off the bed and on his feet faster than he thought he was capable of moving.  
  
He tries three doors before finding the bathroom, which is small and furnished with a stack of moth-eaten towels and a cracked sliver of harsh soap on the edge of the sink. In the light of day, this whole house exudes an air of faint neglect, like nobody's really lived here for a while. It makes Damien feel vaguely sad for no real reason he can put his finger on.  
  
When he shuffles into the kitchen, Barnes is already there, carefully buttering a stack of toast. He glances up when Damien comes in and gives him a sleepy smile, and for a minute it's just like any other Saturday morning. Except for the fact that instead of their sleek little kitchen with a whiteboard on one wall and a Star Trek poster on the other, they're still in Bobby Singer's house, and there are jars of things Damien isn't sure he wants to identify sitting on the counter next to the coffee maker. Coffee smells fantastic, though, so he decides not to worry about it.   
  
"How are you feeling?" Damien asks cautiously. Barnes shrugs, which Damien takes to mean that his command of the English language hasn't yet returned. His color is better this morning, though, and he's eating, which already makes this a vast improvement over the past week. "Where's Bobby?"  
  
Barnes gestures with a piece of toast at the front porch. The screen door is open, and the breeze winding in is just a few degrees shy of crisp. It's early; there are still long shadows stretched across the kitchen floor and the air tastes faintly damp, no hint of the dry heat that Damien knows is coming later on.  
  
It feels like the beginning of a beautiful day. Later, he'll think that that, right there, should have been his first warning.

***

Damien's seated cautiously at the kitchen table, sipping coffee from a chipped green mug, when Bobby rolls back inside. He spares Damien a brief glance before wheeling himself over to the sink and dumping his own mug in. "'Morning."  
  
"Good morning," Damien says back, carefully. Under the table, Barnes nudges his foot. Damien nudges him back, takes another drink of his coffee, tries to think. Now that Barnes isn't acting like an escapee from  _Girl, Interrupted_ , Damien's brimming with questions, but he's not sure whether or not he's allowed to ask any of them. Maybe it's like the first rule of Fight Club, or something. You do not talk about ghost-hunting. "Uh--"  
  
"Gave him the second dose before you got up," Bobby says. "Should take pretty soon, but you might as well stick around until we know for sure."  
  
"Thank you," Damien says, while Barnes nods fervently. "So--"  
  
A shrill ringing splits the air before he can finish the word, and his hands fly up involuntarily to his ears. The phone, he realizes belatedly. There's a whole line of them on the wall by the door, all labeled in permanent marker and masking tape.  
  
"Shit," Bobby mutters, spinning across the kitchen and grabbing unerringly for the phone nearest the window. "What in hell have you idjits got yourselves into now?" he barks into the receiver without preamble.  
  
Then, quieter, "Oh,  _hell._  Coulda had better timing, you know. I got folks here. They got--Well, God damn it, what do you want me to do? Just get your asses over here, pronto. Yeah. Yeah, now stop yapping and start driving."  
  
He hangs up and turns to face them, grim-faced. "We got a problem."  
  
Barnes swallows audibly.  
  
"Sir?" Damien says cautiously.  
  
"That was Dean," says Bobby, and the tone of his voice chases away any thrill Damien might be feeling at the mention of the name. "They're on their way, and they're bringing a boatload of trouble with them. If you boys don't want to get caught up in the middle of it, you best be on your way now."  
  
"What kind of trouble?" Damien hears himself ask. Bobby's eyes narrow to slits beneath the tattered brim of his hat.  
  
"Nothing you want to be mixed up in, believe me. And it's--oh hell." He turns suddenly, as though in response to something that neither of them can hear. " _Damn_  it."  
  
"What?" Damien says, distantly proud to hear that his voice doesn't shake even a little. Even if it has gone up about an octave.  
  
"Change of plans," Bobby says, terrifyingly. "Something outside's whaling on the border wards. Whatever's on their tail, it's already here." He grimaces, shoves his hat back to run his fingers through tangled, iron-gray hair. "Afraid you two are stuck here for the duration. Ain't much that could get past those hex bags we planted, but anybody leaving the property is fair game."  
  
"Sam and Dean--"  
  
"They got hex bags, all we can do now is wait here, hope they make it through.  _Pray,"_   he spits, like the word's a curse.  
  
"What--" Barnes says suddenly. His voice is raspy, but in spite of everything it's the best thing Damien's heard all day. He clears his throat and tries again, voice stronger this time. "What can we do to help?"

***

The answer, as it turns out, is  _not much._  Bobby loads his shotgun and goes out onto the porch to stare at the driveway, fingers drumming absently against the wheel of his chair. After a moment, Damien follows him. The yard is flooded with sunlight, gleaming on the chrome of dozens of junkers and outlining blades of grass in sharp relief. It's almost impossible to believe, looking at it, that there are monsters or demons or--something--prowling around the edges of the property, but Bobby's tension communicates itself to Damien and he finds himself shifting his weight back and forth, hands jammed in his pockets.

After five minutes or so of Bobby saying absolutely nothing, he feels like he might spontaneously combust from nerves. "I'm just gonna--" he says, and motions vaguely at the door. Bobby grunts something that might be acknowledgment and doesn't take his eyes off the dusty stretch of road winding out the front gate.

Inside, Barnes is at the sink, washing dishes. He always cleans when he's nervous, and it's so normal, so  _Barnes_ , that Damien feels a little of his tension bleed away in spite of himself. "Hey," he says gently.

"Are there any more coffee cups over on the table?" Barnes asks, voice high and tight. 

"I think you've already washed everything in this kitchen," Damien says, looking around.

  
"Oh God," Barnes says suddenly, turning to lean his butt against the sink and putting both hands over his face. "We're gonna die."  
  
Damien crosses the kitchen and pulls him in close. "We're not going to die," he whispers against Barnes' cheek. "I promise, we're not going to die."  
  
Barnes sniffs. "I just feel so  _useless_ , you know? I mean, it's all real, it's Sam and Dean and Bobby and if I could just  _do_ something it wouldn't be so bad but I'm just sitting here washing  _dishes_  and--"  
  
"Calm down," Damien murmurs, pulling him in closer. His t-shirt is damp with nervous sweat and he hasn't had a shower in a couple of days, but Damien doesn't care at all. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you, you dork."  
  
Barnes huffs out a small, wet laugh against Damien's hair, and doesn't say anything else. For a few minutes, they just stand there, embracing in the empty kitchen, and at first Damien thinks the dull roar he's hearing is just the echo of blood pounding in his ears. Then Barnes lifts his head too, and he realizes that the sound is coming from out front. Barnes comes to the same conclusion at almost the same moment as Damien, and there's a brief tangle of limbs when they both try to scurry toward the door.  
  
They make it out to the front porch in time to see a big black muscle car speed underneath the sign for Singer Salvage, hurtling toward the house with no sign of slowing down. Dean's '67 Chevy Impala, and even under the circumstances Damien can't quite keep his breath from catching in his throat when the driver jacknifes to a stop a few yards from the porch, spitting gravel and dust everywhere. Then he glances up at the road behind them, and his breath catches for an entirely different reason.   
  
For a wild instant, he thinks it's a low-flying thunderhead or something, the roiling cloud of darkness that manages to simultaneously give the impression of oily smoke and a writhing knot of black snakes barreling toward the farmhouse. It gets as far as the junkyard sign, and it's like there's a glass wall-- _bulletproof glass_ , he thinks, hysterically--wrapped around the property; the  _thing_  breaks against an invisible plane and speeds off in all different directions.  
  
"Holy shit," Barnes murmurs, bug-eyed. Bobby glances back at them.  
  
"You," he says to Damien. "Get on down there and give them a hand."  
  
"I--what?"  
  
"Now is not the time to be squeamish," Bobby snaps, like  _that_ was his problem, but this is  _so_  not the time to have a debate about it. He nearly trips on the porch steps, stumbles hard, recovers just as the engine cuts off. The filthy, blood-spattered man who bursts out of the driver's side door is unmistakeably the same guy he met at the convention, and Damien's brain stutters a little, reality and fiction crashing together in a way that's almost painful.  
  
Dean barely glances at him. "You a friend of Bobby's?"  
  
"I--um--yeah."  
  
"Good. Some help here?" He's jerking open the back door as he speaks, and when Damien gets a look at what's inside, he forgets about his panic and his disorientation and everything else. The man sprawled out in the back seat looks as though he's been beaten within an inch of his life; his face is a gruesome patchwork of bruises and he's leaking blood all over the place. He's not moving. "Get his feet," Dean says shortly, and begins hauling the guy out.  
  
Damien wants to say something about stretchers and backboards, but then his arms are full of limp, bloody legs and it's either lift or drop. He lifts. The man isn't all that big, but he's heavier than Damien would have expected, even with Dean taking half the weight. Distantly, he notices the passenger door slam shut, sees a tall figure that must be Sam unfolding himself from the seat. He's clutching his right arm, and there's something very wrong about the angle of his elbow but Damien can't pay attention to that now. He stumbles when Dean begins to walk, then regains his footing and carefully matches pace with him as they climb the steps.  
  
"Jesus," Bobby says, sounding shaken. "You weren't kidding."  
  
"Yeah, because this is totally something I'd fucking joke about," Dean snarls.  
  
Bobby shakes his head. "Christ. You don't do things by halves, do you? You, boy--Barnes--get the door."  
  
In the living room, Sam clears the couch off with a gigantic sweep of his good arm, dumping books and bags and scrolls onto the moth-eaten carpet, and they set the man down. Damien stands up, wiping his bloody hands on his shorts, but Dean sinks to his knees beside the couch and strokes the man's dark hair away from his face. His fingers are gentle, but when he looks up his face looks like it's been carved from pale stone.

  
"Okay," Bobby says behind Damien. "You want to tell me what the hell happened?"  
  
"I don't fucking  _know_ , okay? Couple of demons just dropped him in our hotel room, but there's no way those sons of bitches could do something like this to Cas." Dean sounds tense and furious. And _frightened,_  which was something that was never really in the books. If Damien wasn't already shaking in his shoes, that sound would definitely do the trick. Dean is supposed to be the hero. He's supposed to be invincible.   
  
Dean isn't looking heroic or invincible right now. He looks tired and worried and unexpectedly human, and when the man on the couch mumbles something, Dean touches his cheek and leans down to murmur anxiously in his ear. Close as he's standing, Damien still can't make out the words, but he understands the tone just fine. It's the one he was using himself on Barnes fifteen minutes ago. The one that says  _calm down, it's okay, I'm here._  
  
Huh.  
  
Barnes catches his eyes from the doorway, brows raised, but if Sam or Bobby notice anything unusual, they don't comment on it. "--tell me what happened?" Bobby is saying quietly.  
  
"Low-level," Sam says in a pale, faded kind of voice. He's cradling his right arm against his chest. "We took care of them, but next thing we know there's a swarm of the bastards on our tail. Bobby, they were after him, not us. We barely got him out to the car in one piece."  
  
"That ain't good. How's your arm?"  
  
Sam winces. "I was trying not to think about that, thanks. Elbow's dislocated. I'll be fine. Take care of Castiel."

The man on the couch--Castiel--flails suddenly, violently, clutching Dean's arms and hauling himself up. His eyes fly open, and they're a dazed and vivid blue. "έρχονται," he gasps. "μπορώ να τους σταματήσω. χρειάζομαι--"   
  
"Shit," Dean mutters. "Sam?"  
  
"He's disoriented," Sam says. "The last time he was on earth--"  
  
"--fucking Agamemnon was storming the gates of Troy," Dean says furiously. "Cas. Cas, come on, man, you gotta speak English."  
  
"δαίμονες," the man mutters. "έρχονται δαίμονες--"  
  
" _Cas._  Dude, we can't understand you. Please--"  
  
"He says that demons are coming."  
  
It's Barnes' voice. The room goes abruptly and entirely silent., and Damien feels his mouth falling open as he turns. "What?"  
  
"He says that demons are coming," Barnes repeats. His face is ashen and his eyes are huge, but he looks resolute. "He says he can stop them. I can understand him."  
  
"Woah," Dean says. He's looking between Barnes and Damien like he's really seeing them for the first time since he arrived. "It's you guys. What are you doing here?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What Cas says can be translated, more or less, as "They're coming, I can stop them. I need--" and "Demons. Demons are coming." And my Greek is a bit rusty, so I can't fully vouch for the quality of the translation. :)


	4. Chapter 4

"It's..." Damien swallows. Barnes steps carefully across the rug and takes his hand, and he laces their fingers together gratefully. It feels like the whole room is holding its breath; even the man on the couch has stilled for a moment. "Uh, it's kind of a long story."  
  
Dean's still looking back and forth between them like he's not entirely sure they're really there, brow furrowed incredulously. "Yeah, I'll bet. We make it out of here alive, I'm gonna want to hear it."  
  
And that, of course, has the effect of reminding everybody of what's outside. Demons. Sweet Jesus, Barnes was right. They're all going to die.  
  
"Ow," Barnes says quietly, fingers twitching where Damien is crushing them.  
  
Guiltily, he loosens his hold. "Sorry."  
  
Dean glances at their joined hands, and for an instant something that's almost a smile finds its way onto his face. Then the man on the couch starts mumbling again and its like everybody else in the room just disappears.  
  
"Hey, Cas." His voice is almost painfully gentle. "Hey, it's okay. We got you a translator, man, not that I'm gonna mind if you decide to, you know, speak English--"  
  
"Okay," Bobby says abruptly. "Game plan. Sam, your arm--"  
  
"I told you, it's fine."  
  
"Don't give me that  _I'm fine_  bullshit, boy. You. Damien."  
  
He starts a little. "What?"  
  
"You come give me a hand re-setting his elbow. Barnes, you stay here, tell Dean what Castiel needs to keep us in one piece." When nobody moves, he sweeps a withering glare around the room. "Unless you'd all rather just sit here with our thumbs up our asses until those bastards break through?"  
  
"Dean--" Sam starts.  
  
Without looking away from his charge, Dean flicks a hand in his direction, a vague gesture that must mean something to Sam, because he makes a dissatisfied sound in the back of his throat and heads into the kitchen. Damien glances at Barnes, swallows hard, and lets go of his hand. His empty palm feels damp and too cold, but he squares his shoulders and follows Sam. He can hear the squeak of Bobby's wheels behind him, Barnes' nervous murmur and the low rasp of Dean's voice replying. The cluttered kitchen looks obscenely bright and still smells pleasantly of coffee.  
  
Sam sinks onto a kitchen chair that sits in a square of yellow sunlight. His hair is sticking to his forehead and his breath sounds harsh.  
  
"You don't look so good," Damien tells him, cautiously.  
  
Sam blows out a quick breath that almost sounds like a laugh. "Thanks a lot."  
  
"No, I mean, it's just--" He looks down at his hands, plump and soft and useless-looking compared to Sam's giant brown paws. "I've never set somebody's elbow before. I don't know what to do."  
  
 "You don't do anything," Bobby says, rolling into view. "You brace his arm and I set it. Grab his shoulder."  
  
"Oh," Damien says. "Okay." Tentatively, he reaches out and grips the solid curve of Sam's shoulder. God, the guy's like Goliath, or something. Freaking huge.  
  
"Tighter," Bobby orders, and Damien adjusts his grip. "Good. Sam, you ready?"  
  
"Just get it over with," Sam says tightly, and Bobby grabs ahold of his arm, pulls and twists in a way that makes him bite out a vicious curse. Damien winces and looks away. He can feel muscles jumping under his palm, and then Sam swears again and sighs. "Jesus, Bobby, you're a sadist, you know that?"  
  
"You're welcome," Bobby says sourly. "If you want--"  
  
Before he can finish, a booming crack splits the air, a sound that reminds Damien obscurely of the time when he was twelve and his dad took him to see a demonstration of the B-2 Stealth Bomber. It made a noise just like that when it broke the sound barrier, and he doesn't know what that sound means now, but it can't be anything good.  
  
"Shit," Sam says quietly. "Bobby--"  
  
Bobby's face looks gray beneath his beard. "Yeah, they broke through. The house wards should hold, but--"  
  
"Panic room?"  
  
"No good. Last thing I had in there cracked the devil's trap and--"  
  
There's a loud thud from the living room, and then the light just goes--wrong. Dark. Not like something is blocking it but like some kind of giant hand turned down a dimmer switch on the sun.  
  
"God-damn motherfucking son of a  _bitch!"_   Dean's voice, rising to a sudden shout, and Sam is out of his chair and striding across the room, bad arm apparently forgotten. Damien follows him as far as the doorway and stops there, putting out a hand to hold onto the doorframe like it's going to keep him safe. This is nothing--nothing--like he imagined. He can't do anything. Here's these three tough demon-hunters straight out of a storybook--literally--and then there's him. And Barnes. They're so  _screwed._  
  
The strange man--Castiel--is laying in a heap on the floor, hands gripping the sides of his head. There's fresh blood oozing between his fingers. Barnes is sitting cross-legged by his feet, looking dazed.  
  
"Dean?" Sam says quietly. "What--"  
  
Dean doesn't look up from where he's kneeling next to the man, and when he speaks his voice is tight. "Bobby, please tell me you have sage grass and an iron bowl."  
  
"I look like a goddamn amateur to you? In the pantry."  
  
Sam spins on his heel and heads back into the kitchen. Damien can hear him rummaging around, pots and pans clashing together with a sound that's too loud and bright for this oppressive silence.  
  
There's another cracking sound, and the house shudders. Upstairs, something heavy crashes to the floor.  
  
"Sam?" Dean calls. "Now would be a good time to hurry your ass up."  
  
"Oh, you think so?" Sam says breathlessly, striding back into the room with a handful of pungent herbs in one hand and a heavy black bowl in the other. He sets both down in front of Dean. "I thought you were the one always telling me to stop and smell the roses. Do you have any idea what you're doing?"  
  
"Not a clue," Dean says with grim good humor. He jerks a thumb at Barnes. "He does, though. Supposedly."  
  
What?  
  
"Blood of darkness and light," Barnes intones in a voice that doesn't sound anything like his own. He looks up, and his eyes slide over Damien without recognition. It's just like at the hospital, just like the past week, and it makes Damien want to scream but he can't make his mouth move.   
  
Dean barely glances over as he pulls a wicked-looking blade out of his boot. "I'm guessing that means--"  
  
"--me and Castiel," Sam says bleakly. "Right. Of course." He takes the knife from Dean and cuts a quick slice across the palm of his good hand, squeezing it so that blood dribbles down to pool in the bottom of the bowl. Dean repeats the process with an unresisting Castiel, runs a gentle thumb across the man's knuckles before he lets go.  
  
"Lighter."  
  
Sam starts digging through his pockets, but it's Bobby who comes up with one first. He throws it at Dean, who plucks it deftly out of the air without looking up. He flicks it on and holds the small flame against the bundle of herbs until it begins to smoke, then drops it into the bowl.  
  
For a long, breathless moment, nothing happens. The pungent smoke winds up slowly, heavy in the dim air, and some small, hysterical part of Damien wants to burst out laughing at the picture they must make: six grown men huddled around a bowl of smoking herbs. Well. Four grown men. Castiel is still sprawled across the carpet like a broken doll, and Barnes' eyes are as wide and blank as two new coins. Damien squeezes his own eyes shut, trying hard to shake off the sickened chill, and when he opens them again the bowl is glowing.  
  
 _Fire_  is his first thought, but this isn't like any firelight he's ever seen. It's white, cold and pure, radiating out from the metal bowl like a small sun. Growing, too, expanding to illuminate Dean's gaunt cheekbones, Sam's sweat-dark hair, the ragged brim of Bobby's baseball cap, the dusting of stubble beginning to shade Barnes' upper lip. Barnes' mouth is moving. That's the last thing he sees before the light takes him, and maybe he can hear the painful echo of an impossible voice, or maybe it's just a hallucination swooping down on him.  
  
The light swallows everything, swallows Damien and casts him down into darkness.

***

"...mien? Damien? Damien, wake up, please wake up--"  
  
Light. That's the first thing he notices, even through his eyelids. Sunlight, or something a lot like it.  
  
"Are you sure he's okay? Are you--"  
  
"Yes." The voice is unfamiliar, gravelly and deep. "He is not injured."  
  
"Cas?" A thud, a shuffle, then, "Cas, I swear to God, if you ever pull something like that again I'm gonna--"  
  
"Dean, are you--"  
  
"Sammy? Is Bobby okay?"  
  
"--don't you ask me yourself, boy, did you lose your manners along with the rest of your brain cells?"  
  
Fingers are on his face, soft, slender fingers. Familiar. Barnes. Damien opens his eyes.  
  
Barnes is looming over him, eyes dark and huge. He looks like he's gone ten rounds with a hurricane, and when he speaks his voice is cracking up the registers. "Damien?"  
  
Damien tries out a smile on lips that feel like they're made out of Play-Dough. "Hi."  
  
Anything else he might have said is muffled, because he's suddenly being kissed soundly. And that's really more than okay.  
  
"Jesus Christ, I thought we were all dead," Barnes says when he pulls away. "Jesus Christ."  
  
"Welcome to our life," says Dean from somewhere to Damien's left. He sounds like he was aiming for amused but ran out of energy halfway there. Damien gets his elbows under him and levers himself up into a sitting position. The living room is a disaster zone of shredded papers, cracked furniture, and broken glass. There's a black crater where the bowl was sitting, and the setting sun is casting bloody fingers across the floor.  
  
Wait a second. He shakes his head, a little gingerly; it feels weirdly fragile, like it might come loose from its moorings and roll away if he isn't careful. "What happened?"  
  
"We lost some time," says Barnes anxiously. "Most of the day, I think. I don't know. I mean, he was just talking--Castiel--and then--"  
  
"--he mind-whammied you," says Dean. "Freaking angels, man. No manners."  
  
"I apologize," says the gravelly voice. "It was necessary."  
  
Damien blinks, looks around. Dean is leaning against the couch, head back against the seat cushions. Sam is on the floor next to him with an arm flung over his eyes. Bobby's in his wheelchair, head drooping like a tired horse's, and standing beside him is--huh.  
  
It's the man he helped Dean carry in, but his skin is smooth and undamaged, his clothes neat and clean, not a trace of blood of grime. His dark hair is artfully tousled and he's surveying the demolished living room with an expression of detached interest.  
  
"I'm taking the cleaning bill out of your hide," Bobby grumbles without lifting his head.  
  
"I apologize," says the man again. "I did not expect them to catch on so quickly, or I would have given myself more time to escape."  
  
"You are a shitty guardian angel," Dean says distinctly. "Can't even keep your own stupid skin in one piece. I want a refund."  
  
An brief smile flickers across the man's ascetic face. "I did say that I had no plans of perching on your shoulder."  
  
"Yeah, bang-up job with that," says Dean, but he's smiling too, eyes closed, exhaustion written into the lines of his blood-smeared face.  
  
Barnes' hand spreads out warm and familiar against Damien's shoulder blade, an anchor of normal. "Are you okay?" he asks quietly.  
  
Damien considers this very seriously. "No," he says at last, and Barnes lets out a surprised little meep of laughter.  
  
"Yeah," he says. "Me neither."  
  
"You need a beer," says Dean without opening his eyes. "I need a beer too. Cas?"  
  
"I am not getting you a beer," Castiel says gravely, picking his way across the detritus on the floor to Dean. When he stops by the couch, Dean hooks an arm around his calf and leans his cheek against his knee.  
  
"See what I mean? Shitty excuse for a guardian angel." His voice is muffled by the fabric of Castiel's trousers. "I want beer. Sammy, get me a beer."  
  
"Screw you," Sam mumbles without moving his arm.  
  
Castiel is looking at Damien, and Damien's never been so glad of the long bony line of Barnes' body against his side. The guy should look ridiculous, standing there in a tan trenchcoat amid the rubble with his head cocked bird-like and Dean hanging on to his leg like a tired child, but he doesn't. His eyes are vividly blue, and his expression is somehow both serene and intense. Like he's learning Damien just by looking at him; like he can see right through to to back of his skull. It makes Damien squirm in his seat.  
  
"Stop staring," Dean murmurs. "Dude, we've talked about this. It freaks people out when you do that."  
  
Castiel inclides his head, and Damien breathes out an involuntary sigh of relief. "I don't believe we've been introduced."  
  
"What?" Dean finally looks up, bleary-eyed. "You turn the poor bastard into a pod person because you  _forgot how to speak English_ and now you want me to make introductions?"  
  
"It would be polite."  
  
"Yeah, 'cause I'm real big on that." Dean rolls his eyes. "Cas, this is Barnes and Damien. They saved my ass once, so be nice. Barnes, Damien, this is Castiel, angel on the lam."


	5. Chapter 5

Bobby's porch is dark and quiet, low enough to the ground that when Damien sits down on the edge of it the tips of his sneakered toes brush the dead grass that's grown up around it. There's a beer in his hand, but he doesn't remember how he got it--he doesn't even  _drink_ beer, for God's sake. His thumb is idly rubbing over the loose edge of the label, over and over again. Inside, Barnes is helping an angel--an  _angel_ \--fix lasagna. He's handling this much better than Damien, and that just throws Damien off even more. He's supposed to be the one calming Barnes down. He's the level-headed one, and yet he's the one sitting out here, having a panic-attack party for one while Barnes cooks dinner.  
  
Ghosts are one thing. But angels and demons? That's, like, huge. Epic.  
  
The front door swings open, then shut. Damien's expecting it to be Barnes joining him for a little belated post-near-death freakout, but when he turns around it's Dean crossing the porch toward him, booted feet heavy on the creaky boards. He's cleaned the blood off his face and changed into a clean, faded Led Zeppelin t-shirt, and he still looks nothing like the image Damien still carries in his head from the books. Too rough-edged, too tired and real. Damien's sister runs a bar in Wisconsin, and this Dean looks more like the hollow-eyed roughnecks and soldiers on leave that hang around there than anybody's idea of a fantasy hero. He gives Damien a lopsided smile and gestures with the beer in his hand. "You mind if I sit?"  
  
Mutely, Damien shakes his head, and Dean drops down next to him. He smells like strong soap and that pungent herb they burned earlier. "How you holding up?" he says at last.  
  
"I feel really stupid," Damien admits. "I mean, you  _told_  me who you were, and I didn't believe you."  
  
Dean shrugs and lifts his beer to his lips. "Don't sweat it. I wouldn't have believed me either."  
  
"And this--this is just--" he lifts his hands, trying ineffectually to sketch out the hugeness of this thing that they've bumbled into.  
  
"Believe me, I know."  
  
Yeah, Dean probably does know, way better than he does or ever will. If even a fraction of the books are true, it's a wonder he's not curled in a fetal position somewhere in a padded cell. "How do you deal with it?"  
  
"You don't," Dean says simply. "You just learn to stop thinking about it."  
  
"That doesn't sound very healthy," Damien says tentatively, and Dean barks out a raspy laugh.  
  
"That's what Sam keeps telling me." He shakes his head. "Hey, man, I'm a hunter, not a shrink. I just do what it takes to get me through the day."  
  
He's smiling, still, but something about the way he says it is so sad that Damien has to look away. The kitchen window casts a yellow square of light across the lawn, glinting on the bits of metal and broken glass scattered among the weeds. Through the window he can see the top of Bobby's hat, Barnes standing by the counter in his X-Men t-shirt. He's smiling shyly, tentatively, eyes big in the lamplight.  
  
"He really makes you happy, huh?" Dean asks quietly. Damien looks back over. There's still some part of him that's expecting the kind of reaction a pair of queer geekboys like him and Barnes always get from guys like Dean, but Dean's shadowed face just looks pensive. His cheeks are hollow and the rising moon cuts into the crow's feet beginning to form at the corners of his eyes, the furrow between his brows, the tension lines around his mouth. If the books were right, Dean's only thirty-one. Just a few years older than Damien. He doesn't look it.  
  
"Yeah," Damien says. "He does."   
  
Dean smiles. "Good. That's a good thing."  
  
"Yeah." He hesitates. It's really not any of his business. Ghost-hunting was one thing, but this is something way bigger than he imagined. Angels and demons. The end of the world. The literal end of the world. There's an angel--a real, honest-to-God  _angel_ \--standing in Bobby's cluttered kitchen greasing a lasagna pan. Damien's got a feeling that when he and Barnes get back to their apartment, they're going to have to sit down and do some serious self-examination.  
  
But for now, here's Dean. A badass fantasy-hero demon-hunter in the flesh, sitting out here on this dark porch with a beer, and Damien knows what he saw. How Dean looked at Castiel.  
  
"So," he finds himself saying before he can think better of it. "You and, the, uh, angel?"  
  
Immediately after the words are out of his mouth, he wants to slap himself, but it's too late. Dean just shrugs, rolling his bottle thoughtfully between his palms, but he doesn't seem annoyed by the question.  
  
"Sorry," Damien mutters. Awkwardness really isn't anything new to him, and most of the time he's pretty much okay with that. Most of the time. "None of my business."  
  
"It's a funny world," Dean says after a few more moments of silence. Damien can't tell from his tone whether it's supposed to be an answer or not; he has his face tilted up toward the sky and his expression is a thousand miles away.  
  
"Uh," Damien says. "Dean?"  
  
Dean glances over, smiles a little. "You should head back inside, give your boyfriend a hand. Cas is all about smiting evil, but he can't cook for shit."  
  
It startles a laugh out of Damien. Dean's smile broadens enough to show the sharp edges of teeth, and maybe now Damien can see, just for a moment, the angel-faced drifter in Carver Edlund's stories; the sweet-talking conman who charmed his way out of jail and into beds across the continental U.S.  _The_  Dean Winchester.  
  
God knows how much of the story is actually true, but it's a nice thought.  
  
On the other side of the kitchen window, Barnes is laughing while something crashes loudly to the floor. The dog is barking, and he can hear Bobby yell, "...your face out of the damn salad dressing, Romney, you stupid mutt--"  
  
"I think I will go inside," Damien says, pushing himself to his feet. "Are you coming?"  
  
"In a minute," Dean says, looking back out at the graveyard of scrap-metal and ancient cars. Damien hesitates for a moment before turning away, and he's halfway across the porch when Dean says, "Hey, uh. Damien."  
  
"What?"  
  
When he glances back, Dean is looking at him. Still smiling, a little. "You know, not that--" he shrugs. "The world needs people out there fixing copiers too, man."  
  
For some reason, that's what it takes to unwind the last panicky little knots in his chest. Damien shoves his hands in his pockets and nods. "Thank you."  
  
"Hey," Dean says. "Don't thank me. Get inside there and keep them from wrecking dinner, we'll call it even."  
  
Damien nods again. He can do that much.


End file.
